Dukes of Hazzard Family
by Thor2000
Summary: A girl resembling Jessica Simpson passes through Hazzard, but her name, identity and past is keeping everyone running in circles round her as the movie crosses with the series.
1. Default Chapter

_Balladeer – "Welcome to Hazzard County or as I like to call it, Land of the Camshaft and Bootleg Whiskey. If you look closely, you will see two of Hazzard's favorite sons, Bo and Luke Duke and up the road apiece is Sheriff Rosco P. Coltrane pretending to be the closest thing to the law here about. What he really does here is chase the Dukes and despite the practice they give him, he's not getting very good at it."_

The orange Dodge stock car charged over the dirt country roads with the speed and roar of the ancient beasts that once conquered this land. Rabbit and squirrel heard the roar of eight pistons pounding and the loose gravel and dust being thrown up by spinning wide tires moments before the orange metallic beast roaring over bare earth. The young man at the wheel cheered to hear the car tearing up the countryside around them. The Confederate flag image emblazoned in paint to the roof sometimes seemed to wave in the breeze pouring over the vehicle and the black 01 trimmed in white seemed to slide down the side in the rush of fuel and exhaust. A few second more and the orange beast of metal, glass and rubber would be a vague blurred memory. Even in their minds, they knew the spirit of General Lee conquered these hills and valleys.

"Whoa," Bo grinned excitedly at the steering wheel. "The General has never sounded this good after a tune up."

"Yeah, uh, was it my imagination," Luke Duke looked back behind them through the reflection in the rear view mirror. Or was there a stoplight dropped from down out of that tree?"

"A stoplight?" Bo wondered about it. "In the middle of no where?" He then heard the sirens and lights flashing in his rear view mirror.

"Rosco." The chorused together then pressed the General Lee to reach his limits.

"Hot pursuit, I'm gonna get them, I'm gonna get them!" Rosco giggled so fast his snickering and giggling overlapped. His basset hound named Flash on the seat by him groaned from the excitement and watched Rosco's foot hit the gas and felt the patrol car shot forward from the bushes eager to put the boys in jail. He'd been chasing them since they were boys stealing apples from Old Man MacOrdle's orchard and snatching free meals from the diner. In his heart, he knew they were good boys, but there was a lot of strained rivalry between them trying to do what was better for the good of Hazzard.

The General Lee roared over the unpaved back roads of the county throwing up a breeze of leaves and loose brush while Rosco tried to keep his vehicle to the road on the curves. Ahead of him, the boys in their over-charged stock car disappeared and passed in and out of view behind trees and foliage with the omniscient tunes of bluegrass chords following closer on their heels than the bulky and unwieldy patrol car behind them.

_Balladeer – "Now you might figure this was just another day to Bo and Luke, but let's not forget, they're Dukes, and if they don't find trouble, then trouble finds them. Huh, what'd I tell you?"_

Coming toward the chase on the same stretch of road was a figure on a motorcycle obscured by helmet and leather jacket. The cycle was red and chrome and over-packed with the belongings of someone planning a lot of out door camping and aimless traveling. It's driver was experienced enough to tilt the bike far enough to speed through curves unfazed without tipping over too far. Still a mile ahead, the unlikely and unconstitutional chase of Coltrane and Duke came closer and closer into view.

"Bo," Luke looked to his cousin. "Turn off here at the Old Mill Road; I think we can lose Rosco if we… Bo, look out!" Bo looked up quickly and jerked the wheel back to the left side of the road too late. The motorcycle driver looked up too slowly as well and was overwhelmed by the physics of two objects crashing into each other with deadly force. A crunch of metal and rubber hit the front bar of the General Lee and an all too brief image of the motorcycle driver flung forward over its hood, windshield and roof to continue flying headfirst over them and off the side of the road. Bo hit the break trying to stop and forgot the patrol car behind him. Rosco peered up briefly and saw the General's brake lights before him as he turned as well before slamming side to side against the General Lee. Flash just yawned to the jarring crunch of steel against steel.

"Rosco!" Bo sent him a dirty look.

"Don't mind him!" Luke was pulling himself up through the windows of the welded shut doors of the General and struck boot to dirt road. "That guy might be hurt." He looked in the direction the motorcyclist had flown and rushed surely but slowly down the dry leafy incline down from the road. The ground was soft with years of layered mulch and dew under the shade of the hundred-year-old trees that covered the roadside. The cyclist had flown head first and flipped over in mid air to land on their back into the soft earth and then sliding down clear to the bottom undeterred by the broken limbs and random bushes and saplings sticking up the leafy undergrowth.

"You boys durn went too far this time." Rosco followed up the rear behind Bo Duke. "If you hadn't been speeding you wouldn't hit that guy on the motorcycle."

"Rosco," Bo looked at him again. "May I remind you that if you hadn't been chasing us we wouldn't have hit that guy."

"Oh, yeah, well, if you…" Rosco lost his train of thought in the fog of logic while Luke reached the bottom. Hastening to the prostrate leather clad figure laying on the ground, he dropped to his left knee and looked into the tinted visor on the helmet of the motorcycle rider and hoped they weren't dead. He heard gasping and groaning noises and sounds from the figure wracked in pain.

"Here," Luke carefully unfettered the helmet from their head as a lot of long blonde hair fell out of it. "Let me get you out of that and, whoa…" He found himself looking down on a lovely young lady with brown eyes and long golden locks wracked in pain. Bo stopped where he was and found himself in love a second after trying to shake his senses back to accept what he was seeing. Even Rosco P. Coltrane stopped short and found himself admiring the lovely young beauty.

_Balladeer – "I wasn't expecting that. Now ain't that a feather in your hat…"_


	2. Chapter Two

PART TWO

_Balladeer – "Well, Rosco called an ambulance to pick up that pretty young filly and Cooter hauled back the little lady's cycle. Of course, Bo and Luke wanted to get to know the little lady to apologize for hitting her and maybe getting to know her just a mite better than that. Boss Hogg, of course, had other plans..."_

"I want you Duke boys out of here!" He chased them out on to the front portico of the Hazzard County Hospital while pointing his cigar at them. "You boys are in enough trouble for reckless driving if that young lady decides to sue!"

"Boss, you can't be serious!" Luke was taken aback.

"If Rosco hadn't been…" Bo started.

"Enough of your lies, now, get!" He stuck his burning cigar into his mouth and scowled like a furious portly bulldog wearing a white hat and white suit. Bo and Luke just looked at each other and sighed to each other, but then Luke struck up an idea. He knew the hospital well enough and finding the window of her room to eavesdrop was going to take a few minutes. He motioned to his blonde cousin and directed him to follow. In the stately sterile halls of the interior, he puffed his stogie and looked up to Rosco and Doctor Amos Pettybone motioned past them carrying dark shades from the hospital x-ray machine. He turned to his new patient's room and walked in with good news on his lips.

"Young lady," He walked in with Boss and Rosco behind him and his young blonde beauty laying in a bed before him and looking up to him. She looked up to him painfully as he lit up her x-rays on a light on the wall. "You are very lucky. Your back is going to be just fine barring a few aches and pains, but your left leg is going to be broken for a short time. Now," Doctor Pettybone flicked off the light illuminating the x-ray and lifted a pad with an admission paper. "I am going to need a few things like your name and where you're from…"

"Duke…" She started. The cigar dropped from Boss's lip when he turned his head interestedly.

"Daisy Duke…" The blonde beauty claimed hesitantly. "I was born and raised in Mayberry, North Carolina and I'm traveling through for…"

"You can't be Daisy Duke." Rosco shook his head refusing to believe her. "There's only one Daisy Duke and you don't…"

"Duke?" Doc Pettybone pushed his glasses up his nose. "Are you any relations to…"

"Young lady," Boss pointed at her with his recovered cigar. "We want your real name! Don't be giving us any nonsense like…"

"If you don't believe me…" The would-be imposter turned her head to the fat white figure next to her in the big white cap known as Boss Hogg. She had known him only a few minutes and she already didn't like him. "Look in my knapsack over there. My identification is right on top."

"Well, maybe I will…" Rosco pulled open the top and noticed a ladies purse on top of clothing. "I'm gonna nip this nonsense in the bud. After all, we all know there's only one…" He looked upon a driver's license to a young lady named Daisy Mae Duke who was born in Mayberry, North Carolina. She had a library card, a diner's card and a card for free gas at a place called Goober's Garage. Boss Hogg's eyes bugged a bit trying to refuse the reality he was seeing and the possibility that this young lady just might be possibly related to that aggravating Duke clan.

"Daisy Mae Duke…" Rosco read the card out loud.

"Daisy Duke?" Luke repeated the name outside the room and the other side of the window.

"I don't get it. Why is she telling them she's Cousin Daisy?" Bo looked at Luke. "What do you think she's up to?"

"Some kind of scam, I reckon." Luke leaned back against the bricks of the hospital. "I'd sure like to find out more though."

"I know how." Bo reacted a bit more eager. "Why don't we head on in there and ask her some questions ourselves?"

"Even better," Luke clicked his fingers. "Let's get Uncle Jesse on the radio and get him in here to talk to her!"

_Balladeer – "Now it gets interesting, Luke got Uncle Jesse on the CB in the General…"_

"She says she's who?" Jesse clenched the mouthpiece of the radio set in the main house of the Duke farm. Behind him, his one and only niece named Daisy listened in on the riddle of her imposter. "Why would she say a thing like that?"

"We don't know that, Uncle Jesse." Luke sat in the General Lee and watched Boss and Rosco leaving the Hazzard Hospital. Deputy Enos Strate had arrived a few minutes ago, but hadn't come out with them. "We were going to bust in a talk to her ourselves, but then we thought you might be able to get better answers from her, come back."

"Well, at least you two are using your heads for once other than for growing hair." Jesse rolled his eyes to Daisy. "I'm on my way, over."

"Let's take my jeep, Uncle Jesse." Daisy dropped the laundry. "When I'm through with this girl, she might have a few more broken bones. No one says she's me and gets away with it."

_Balladeer – "And here comes the rest of the Dukes. Boss and Rosco meanwhile headed over to the courthouse to plan for their next move. You know, I'm kind of interested what's going to happen next…"_

"If there's one thing I don't want…" Boss entered the courthouse with his brother-in-law the Sheriff following behind him as usual. "It's another meddling Duke around here, real or otherwise. Now, she claims to be from some little town called Mayberry…"

"Mayberry, huh," Rosco grinned eagerly excited. "My cousin, Jim Lindsey's from up there. He used to play with Bobby Fleet's Band With A Beat." He giggled excitedly just thinking about his cousin's success in the music business.

"Rosco," J.D. Hogg's cigar moved from one side of his mouth to the other. "I don't care hearing about your dipstick relatives. Just check this girl out. Could she be who she is?"

"Who is she?" Rosco turned their strained friendship into an Abbott and Costello routine once more.

"Make the call!" Hogg hollered loud and hard. Jarred by the order just for the moment, Rosco composed himself and dialed zero for the girl who operated the Hazzard County Telephone Switchboard.

"Uh, May Belle," He stared toward J.D. a moment as his eyes floated round the courthouse. "Could you get me the Sheriff up in Mayberry, North Carolina? No, I don't know the area code."

_Balladeer – "Is it me, or do these guys look familiar?"_

A few seconds for the operator to find the area code and get the North Carolina switchboard later, a skinny deputy in a tilted deputy sheriff cap dropped a pillow into the cot of a jail cell and wandered across the first floor of the courthouse and jail. Sheriff Andrew Taylor looked up from his sweeping as his deputy crossed the room and sat at the corner of the desk to pick up the phone. He answered it with the same orderly routine and by the book he maintained in his job.

"Courthouse, Deputy Barney Fife speaking." He answered.

"Oo, yeah," Rosco looked up alert. "Yes, this is Sheriff Rosco P. Coltrane down in Hazzard, Georgia. Could I speak to your Sheriff?"

"Ange," Deputy Barney Fife looked over with confused thoughts mired in the reasons for an out of state call. Maybe someone from Mayberry was in trouble down there or someone from down there was calling to warn them. "You expecting a call from an out of state sheriff?"

"Can't say that I am." Andy walked over handing over the broom as he and his deputy shared household duties in the jail. "Finish the sweeping, will you?" He took the phone. "This is Sheriff Taylor." He took the phone.

"Uh, Sheriff Taylor," Rosco maneuvered the phone for his fat little buddy to listen in as well. "I'm calling about this young lady we got down here claiming she's from your neck of the woods. She says her name is… Daisy Duke." Eavesdropping on the call, Hogg bit down on his cigar listening closely.

"So that's where she got off to." Taylor reflected a bit on recent Mayberry happenings to recall the young wild child. She was born in Mayberry and her mother used to work at the diner before her passing, but the girl he knew as Daisy Duke didn't quite like living in Mayberry. She liked hovering near the gas station helping Goober and Gomer on the cars or outfitting that cycle left behind by moonshiners. Schooling wasn't a major priority to her as much as scrapping and wrestling. Sometimes, it seemed as if she was meant to be born elsewhere. Barney started sweeping a bit slower to listen to Andy's side of the phone conversation.

"Yep," Andy continued as he scratched his left ear a bit relieved she was still alive. "We've been looking for that little lady. She didn't get herself into any trouble, did she?"

"Well," Rosco continued talking to this North Carolina sheriff. He sounded much like a lot of those laid-back, take-it-easy he knew from the area. "She got herself in a bit of a fender bender around here. Does she have any relatives up there?"

"Fraid not…" Andy Taylor sat on his desk as his deputy stopped sweeping to listen. "Her momma passed away last winter and since then she's been about as cooperative as a June bug on a picnic. Her stepfather has had a lot of problems trying to get her to go to school. This ain't the first time she's taken off on her motorcycle either."

"Sheriff," Boss Hogg took the phone. "This is County Commissioner Jefferson Davis Hogg and I promise you that I will hold on to this lady about as tight as I can if you want to come get her. Can you come get her?"

"I can send someone." Andy replied motioning for a pad of paper. "How does one get down there to your parts?"

"Are you writing this down?" J.D. was grinning and laughing as he pressed the phone to his chest. "Rosco, I bet there's a reward for this little lady!" He started laughing out loud with his cigar pressed to his teeth.

_Balladeer - "Well, as Boss started seeing dollar signs, Uncle Jesse started running into interference. Boss was for the first time a few steps ahead of the Dukes by placing Enos to guard their guest at the hospital."_

"I'm sorry, Uncle Jesse," Enos stood guard at the younger Daisy's hospital room. "But Mr. Hogg gave me strict orders not to let anyone in her room, especially anyone named Duke."

"Now, Enos," Jesse Duke remained calm as his niece and nephews groaned at the opposition. "I know you're just doing your job, but that little lady just might be family, and if so, we got to make sure she's okay and who better than her own family."

"Well," Enos thought it over. "I guess if you put it like that." Enos parted and opened the door as the true Daisy Duke furled her fists upset and marched forward. She stopped short as her Uncle Jesse and cousins crowded behind her and scanned the room from the empty bed with the blanket and sheet hanging to the floor and draped down to the direction of the open window. The room was empty.

_Balladeer – "Now, don't that pluck your tail feathers. After all, Enos didn't say anything bout letting someone out of the room."_


	3. Chapter Three

PART THREE

_Balladeer – "Things started buzzing and moving like cats trapped in the dog pound with no way out. Somewhere, there was a little lady calling herself Daisy Duke loose in the county and with enough answers to gag a horse. All the Dukes were scrambling to find her and Daisy herself was ready to chew nails. You know, for someone so pretty, this little lady sure gets in a lot of trouble."_

"Doc Pettybone said she was trying to get to Florida." Jesse talked to his boys over the radio in Daisy's white jeep. "Now, there's only two roads from here she could have reached. You boys check Highway 36 and we'll check Shelby Road."

"We got it, Uncle Jesse."

"What!" J.D. Hogg heard the chatter over the radio and grabbed the mouthpiece for another channel. "Rosco, if them Dukes get their hands on that little lady and my reward, I'll bust you down to dogcatcher!"

"Boss," Rosco responded back on his radio from outside the Boar's Nest, a popular bar and grill. "I'm allergic to dogs!"

"Then you better get unallergic or used to sneezing!" Boss screamed back with a chicken drumstick replacing his cigar. "Stop them Dukes!" He hollered back, dropped his mouthpiece and grabbed his chest trying to calm down. The best thing to calm him right now was the twelve drumsticks, a porterhouse steak and pound of mashed potatoes from the diner.

"Enos," Rosco raced out of the Boar's Nest parking lot kicking up gravel and dirt from the tires of his patrol car. "I'm going to double round through Sutton's Crossing and we'll get them Dukes in between. We got hot pursuit!" He started giggling at the excitement. "I love it! I love it!"

"Understood, sheriff." Deputy Enos Strate unerringly obeyed his commanding officer and pressed the gas pedal to the floor as he caught a brief glimpse of the General Lee ahead of him with Bo and Luke driving it. There was two hundred feet ahead of him and the General Lee and he started shortening it hoping he wasn't noticed coming up on them.

"Enos." Luke looked behind them on the road.

"I guess we're not the only one's looking for this little lady." Bo focused on the road twisting and weaving toward the highway.

"It looks like it." Luke held on as Bo increased speed. "Head down there." He pointed to an old mill road down toward the creek weaving in their direction. Following behind them, Enos continued following their cloud of dust down through logging ruts used to horse drawn wagons and tractors. Dry dirt crunched and flew through the air under and around them as Bo continued charging further with the General Lee at his command. The orange stock car sometimes acted as if it loved these chases as much as the boys who drove it.

"We're gonna get them. We're gonna get them!" He giggled as an overanxious kid. "Hang on, Flash!" Rosco saw the General Lee from a distance and then realized the creek crossing between them. Bo charged as a modern soldier of the Confederacy toward the incline before him leading up to the creek and cheered jumping over it. Enos saw it too as the boys in their orange stock car passed a foot from Rosco in flight over the creek smashing into Enos behind them in mid air. Patrol car met patrol car leaping in unison and smashing into each other above the creek ready to drop to her in the form of two monstrous metallic behemoths going for a swim. Several yards away, the General found a new airborne shortcut to the highway.

_Balladeer - "If this continues, Hazzard might need its first air traffic controller."_

"Enos! You, dipstick!" Rosco waved his wet and drenched fist at him. "Didn't you see I had the right of way?" By his side, Flash lifted his head to breath above the water reaching over the seat.

"How could I get out of the way, sheriff?" Enos clung to his patrol car flooded into three feet deep of water.

_Balladeer – "Meanwhile, the lady behind this mess was reaching the county line, but guess who found her first?"_

"Young lady," Cooter Davenport leaned across the front seat of his tow truck. "Are you sure you're going to be okay? What about your cycle?" He looked out the passenger side door as the blonde beauty he had picked up slid out on to her crutches while wearing her duffle sack as a backpack.

"I'll get it when I pass through again." She beamed back with a touch of Southern charm. "Besides, who couldn't resist a blonde Georgia peach hitching with a broken leg?"

"I can't argue with that logic." Cooter grinned with the wild look of a harmless madman and admired her figure. "More power to you." He sat back as the young beauty slammed the door shut. Foot off the brake, Cooter looked back at her reflection in his rear view mirror as his tow truck lurched forward for the junkyard across the eastern county line into Crockett County. It was getting a bit quiet as voices jumped from his radio.

"Shepard calling lost sheep," It was Uncle Jesse's voice. "Did you find that little filly yet? Over."

"Not yet," Luke called back. "We had to lose Rosco and Enos first. Over."

"Are you boys looking for a blonde goddess with a broken leg heading for points south?" Cooter grabbed his mouthpiece. "I just dropped one off near the county line near the junction on Highway 36, over."

"That's her!" Luke's eyes lit up as Bo cheered in triumphant glee. "Thanks, Cooter!"

"She's further ahead than we thought." Bo pressed the gas pedal again. A radio eavesdropping J.D. Hogg started grabbing his hair and stomping his hat as Daisy Duke took her jeep cross country to catch up over field and pasture. As they continued bouncing and hopping over gopher holes and rolling terrain, the General Lee caught sight of her. Looking behind herself while thumbing for a car, Daisy Mae Duke from Mayberry, North Carolina recognized the orange car with the confederate flag and stepped back as it screeched to a stop before her. Bo sprung up first ready to confront her.

"Little lady, we want to talk to you!" He pointed upset at her.

"Bo, calm down." Luke stepped down out of the window of the General Lee. "Now, miss, you've got our family stretched from one end of the county to the other looking for you. All we want to know is one thing. Is your name really Daisy Mae Duke?"

"What's it to you?" She copped a bit of a country attitude and leaned on to her left crutch. "Are you guys here to hit my other leg?"

"Well," Bo sat in the driver's side window of the General Lee. "She's got the sass of a Duke. Heck, she reminds me when Daisy was her age."

"Who?" The younger Daisy rolled her eyes confused.

"Our cousin," Luke heard the jeep of their female cousin coming closer. "You see, we're also Dukes and scary as it is, we might be related." Their cousin Daisy skidded to a stop in her jeep with Uncle Jesse by her side. Parking her vehicle, she jumped from it ready to scream and pull hair.

"Young lady, what gives you the right to go round telling people you're…"

"Hold your horses, Daisy," The elderly patriarch restrained one niece from a would-be niece. The blonde girl before him was more than what he expected and an obvious wild child with an undirected look of disrespect for being confronted.

"Now," Jesse continued calm and fatherly. "Young lady, we've got some talking to do. I want you to get in this here jeep and ride to our farm to answer a few questions."

"I ain't getting in no jeep and I ain't going to no farm." The younger girl spoke up. Bo started laughing at her attitude while his female cousin rolled her eyes. Jesse looked to Luke shrugging his shoulders and realized just what kind of a girl with which he was dealing. He decided on how to treat her.

"You get your rear end in that jeep before I send you to tarnation and back!" Jesse ordered her as the family protector he tried to be.

"Yes, sir…" The young girl hobbled over respectfully and into the front seat as Luke eased her pack off and to the back seat next to his uncle.

_Balladeer – "Well, if she ain't a Duke, she ought to be."_


	4. Chapter Four

PART FOUR

"Let me see here," Jesse Duke sat at the head of the dinner table wearing his glasses and trying to read his own handwriting on a yellow pad. "Your mother's name was Mary Alice Carter, but she never married your father."

"Yes, sir," Daisy Mae Duke ate a dinner of ham, mashed potatoes, corn and biscuits. Her adult counterpart was a bit friendlier to her now by pouring her more sweet tea. After all, they might be related and she wasn't going to begrudge her a good meal. Luke sat nearby as well sipping his coffee across from Bo finishing up his own dinner.

"She raised me by herself for as long as I can recall." The younger girl confessed. "After she died last winter, I found a few envelopes postmarked from Clearwater, Florida that my father had allegedly sent money in and thought I'd go down there to look for him. I just never thought there was anyone else."

"You should have asked." Daisy told her namesake.

"Mom didn't know that much about him." The younger girl confessed. "It seems as if the money just stopped coming after my fifth birthday. She must have figured he died or something."

"What was you gonna do after you got to Clearwater?" Luke rose to pour more coffee to his cup. "Did you have an address?"

"No," Daisy Mae answered. "But I figured someone must have known him."

"I've never been to Florida," Bo sipped milk with his meal. "But there's got to be ten times more people down there than Hazzard. That's a lot of people to ask."

"Luke," Jesse slowly removed his glasses. "When was the last time you heard from your brother, Jud? Didn't he once work in a garage in Tampa?"

"Well, that's a long time ago, Uncle Jesse." Luke answered. "I think he's doing forestry up in Montana now."

"I betcha Tampa ain't that far from Clearwater." Jesse looked from Daisy Mae to his niece Daisy. "And you know, this young lady even looks a bit like your Aunt Daisy. Daisy you were named for her first."

"Uncle Jesse," Daisy dried a plate for the cupboard. "You think she's Jud's daughter."

"Love them and leave them Jud," Bo never did like Luke's brother. "I wouldn't put it past him."

_Balladeer – "Nice to know that Dukes who flock together, gather together, but remember what I said about Dukes always finding trouble."_

"Rosco," Boss Hogg pointed to his simple-minded sheriff with his badge. "I want you to…"

Flash rested on the admitting desk of the police station. Thinking his beloved master was in trouble, he barked with a loud confirmed woof to Boss Hogg.

"Stop bringing that dog in here!" He stuck his cigar in his mouth and clenched his teeth on it as he talked. "Rosco, I want you to get that little lady back here. Go pick her up for questioning! I ain't about to give up no reward to those Dukes."

"But, Boss, don't I need a warrant?" Rosco sat by his beloved dog and stroked his head.

"Warrant?" Hogg pulled out his cigar as the smoke billowed in Rosco's face. "You're the sheriff! Arrest those Dukes for kidnapping, abduction, littering, jaywalking, anything, but bring that young lady back here!"

"I'm going to get her." Rosco collected Flash in his arms to take him out to his patrol car. "Come on, Flash, we got hot pursuit!" He started giggling out loud.

_Balladeer – "Of course, with twice the Dukes, you can expect twice the trouble."_

A blue Ford Tempo turned from Interstate 77 near Charlotte, North Carolina and crossed the state line eventually toward Greenville, South Carolina. Atlanta, Georgia was on this same route and Hazzard was accessible from the State Capitol. Of the two men in the car, the driver was unshaved and trying to stay awake as he followed the directions given him. By his side, his traveling companion pulled down a worn baseball cap over his eyes and leaned into the door to rest. At fifty and seventy miles per hour on the interstate from their starting off place, they were looking forward to a six-hour drive if they didn't stop for gas or food.

"For this drive," The driver focused on large trucks dwarfing him and the other cars on the road. "She had better come with us. I'm getting tired of her shenanigans."

"We're taking her, kicking and screaming." His partner answered.

_Balladeer – "Uh-huh, you know, I think they mean business."_


	5. Chapter Five

PART FIVE

When it was pitch dark at the Duke Farm, it generally meant everyone was asleep. The chickens vanished into the barn, and the cow spent equal times eating and sleeping. Rosco watched the last light go out and saw an opportunity to sneak in and take the girl back. Duke or no Duke, she was going to come along peaceably. Leaving Flash to watch his patrol car, he sneaked toward the farmhouse using stealth methods he had learned in the movies.

"It's so quiet here." Daisy Mae Duke shared her bed with her would-be aunt. "How do you stand it?"

"You never lived on a farm before?" Daisy's voice echoed out of the dark by her side.

"Never." The younger lady answered. "My mom had a little house down from the Sheriff's office. We always heard traffic from the nearby highway, but here, all this silence is driving me nuts."

"You get used to it." Daisy settled back into her pillow. Maybe too used to the silence, she thought she'd heard a noise that shouldn't have belonged. Even with the squirrels and possums loose on the property, nothing should be stirring outside the house. A vague shadow had even past over her window from outside the farmhouse.

"I'm going for some milk." Daisy lied to excuse herself. "You want some?"

"I'm okay." The young girl started scratching her leg around her cast. It felt like it had ants going through it. Older Daisy pulled on her robe and stood in the darkness of the hall outside of the room. The shadows of her cousins were obvious because they both slept shirtless and their brawny shoulders were apparent in shadow; her Uncle Jesse always wore a long nightshirt.

"You heard it too." Jesse spoke.

"Someone's on the property." Bo realized. "I'll give you one guess."

"Rosco." Luke answered. "Boss must want Daisy Mae back." From the back kitchen, the sounds of someone rapping on the back door roused up the small farmhouse. A solitary light came on in the kitchen and Jesse Duke maneuvered past the kitchen table to open the back door. From out of the darkness, Sheriff Rosco Coltrane emerged playing the role of sheriff.

"All right, Dukes," He held up his gun as if it were a mere toy. "Freeze! You're under arrest!" He started giggling under his breath.

"For what?" Jesse could intimidate the simple-minded lawman by just standing up to him.

"Kidnapping!" Rosco revealed. "I know you're holding that girl here against her will."

"Kidnapping?" Jesse responded in disbelief. "Rosco, that darn hat of yours is pulled down so tight it's cut off the blood to your brain. We Dukes have never held anyone anywhere against their will! That young lady is here on her own and can go anytime she wishes."

"Oh," Rosco groaned at that obstacle. "Well, in that case, I'm arresting you for abduction!"

"What's the difference?" Luke looked at Bo snickering at this odd face off and then back to Rosco. The question threw Rosco off a bit as he tried to think up an answer.

"Plenty, I mean…." He looked at Jesse and realized he preferred chasing the boys for speeding rather than facing off against Uncle Jesse. "Uh, come on, Uncle Jesse, I know you're holding that girl and well, Boss wants her back. He got some sort of extradition with that Mayberry Sheriff to come pick her up, and, well, I'd have to arrest you all for holding her."

"Rosco, you so call as look at that girl and I'll…"

"I'll go…" Daisy Mae cut off Uncle Jesse and came out hobbling on a single crutch from behind Daisy. Dressed in cut-off jeans and a t-shirt, she braced herself on her one good leg as her Aunt Daisy turned to her.

"No, girl, we protect our own here." Daisy replied.

"No, I don't want to get ya'll in trouble here." The young girl forced her way into the kitchen. "I'll go," She looked to Rosco. "If you don't arrest any of them for letting me stay here."

"Well," Rosco mustered a thought and realized that Boss just wanted the girl for the reward. He didn't say anything about him having to arrest the Dukes and quite frankly, he didn't want the extra trouble. "At least one of you here is smart. Head on out to that there patrol car!" He grinned ear to ear at how simple and easy this was going. Daisy looked to her cousins and Uncle Jesse and started begging them to help her young niece.

_Balladeer – "That a girl's a bit of something, ain't she? And if you think the Dukes are going to let her get away from them, where have you been? This is Hazzard, ain't it? You know Luke would come up with a plan to free her. Early the next morning, the boys had their plan into effect."_

Parking the General Lee before the courthouse, Luke pulled himself out of the windows of the car behind Bo and hurried for the bars on the windows under the courthouse. One cell was empty, but the blonde beauty sat sitting on the cot in the next cell. She looked to see if someone was watching then

"I got to know one thing." Luke looked at her flawless features through the bars. "Are you in any trouble back home?"

"Well…" Young Daisy rolled her eyes and twisted her hair around the end of her finger.

"She's my brother's kid alright." Luke looked to Bo ready to hook the chains to the back of the General Lee to bust her out of the jail. The chiming and rattling of the myriad rings attracted the ears of someone else discovering the would-be escape.

"Bo and Luke Duke!" Sheriff Rosco P. Coltrane rushed to grab his pistol. "Freeze!"

"Heh…" Bo grinned harmlessly and tossed the chain. "Catch, Rosco!" The would-be lawman fell to his feet trying to hold the long chains. Before him, the boys dashed back for the General Lee. Rosco hurried ready for another race with the boys while behind him Daisy Duke hastened into the courthouse to get Daisy Mae.

_Balladeer – "Now, ain't that slick? While the boys distract Rosco, Daisy rushes in to get Daisy Mae. I wish I had a family like that."_

"Daisy?" Daisy Mae braced on her good leg and held on to the bars. "What's going on?"

"We're getting you out of here, honey." Daisy picked up the keys to the cell and unlocked the cell holding her niece. "Come on, my jeep's over at Cooter's." She pulled open the cell door and turned to the way out, but Deputy Enos Strate stood barring the way.

"Daisy," His heart wasn't into arresting her. "I wish you hadn't gone ahead and done that."

"Enos," Daisy answered sweet and honeyed. "You could let us go if you wished."

"I wish I could, Daisy." Enos replied stepping forward. He pulled out his revolver, but Daisy kicked it out of his hand. Grabbing Enos with a fond touch, she pulled him into the cell and slammed the door on the both of them.

"Go, girl, go!" Daisy yelled for her niece to run as well as she could on one foot. Next to her, Enos scrambled to his feet and watched the young girl hastening up out of the basement cellblock. Testing the locked doors, he looked to Daisy with the keys and then watched her dropping them down the front of her shirt.

"Now, why'd you go and do that?" He scowled upset and confused at the predicament. "What am I going to do?"

"I'm sure you could think of something." She grinned and took his arm to break him out of his shy shell.

Outside the courthouse, Daisy Mae Duke hurried as best as she could on her two crutches and looked to Cooter's Garage across the street. As she looked up, she recognized a familiar blue Ford Tempo stop at the corner between her and the garage. She recognized the figure in the cap behind the wheel and paused from the sight of his traveling companion coming after her.

_Balladeer – "I was wondering when those boys would arrive."_

"What are you doing here!" She looked at the sight of him. He was her stepfather, and she didn't care for him at all.

"Young lady," Her stepfather stood before her pointing his finger at her. "I promised your mother on her death bed to look after you, and quite frankly, you ain't making it easy. Now, I don't care how much trouble you're in this time, but you are coming home!"

"I ain't going any where!" She tried to hit him with her crutch, but her stepfather knocked it away and that lifted her up off her feet. Opening the back of the car with one hand, he tossed Daisy Mae in with a frustrated but careful gesture, slammed the door on her and slid back into the front seat.

"Johnny Paul," His driver started to reason with him. "I don't think this is the way to handle this."

"Let's just head home." His companion grumbled a bit upset as the car rolled past J.D. Hogg in his white open top Cadillac. Hogg's cigar fell from his lip watching his pretty blonde potential reward heading away from him. Leaning over the front seat, he grabbed the speak box off his CB Radio and yelled into it.

"Rosco," He screamed. "Where are you!"

"Chasing the Duke Boys down Highway 36 toward Treetop Lane." Rosco answered back as Flash's ears flapped in the breeze. "They just tried to bust the girl out!"

"Correction!" Hogg hung on as his driver spun his limo around to chase after the Tempo. "She did bust out, and is now heading south on Highway 16 with two strange men. If you don't get her back, I'll bust you down to night watchman at the old Hazzard Ice House!"

"But it's cold in there!" Rosco spun his patrol car round to speed into the other direction. Bo and Luke looked back at him abandoned their chase and acknowledged the chatter they were overhearing from their radio.

"Uncle Jesse," Luke called on the radio. "Did you hear that?"

"I heard that." Jesse started heading south toward Highway 36. "Who do you suppose got her!"

"I have no idea, but I'd sure like to find out!" Luke held on as Bo spun the General lee around to catch up from behind Rosco in his patrol car. On Shelby Road, Cooter began driving back from Crockett County and watched Uncle Jesse speed past him. Not one to miss a good chase, he turned away from Hazzard and joined them on the race to the road for Chickasaw County. Back at the courthouse, Daisy reached her jeep as Enos started up his patrol car.

_Balladeer – "What do you know, he got the key back after all. Now let me get this straight, we got sweet Daisy Mae in the first car shooting toward the highway in Sweetwater up to Mayberry…."_

"Let me out of this car!" Daisy Mae kicked and screamed like a spoiled child as her stepfather rolled his eyes. " I hate you, I hate this car, I hate Mayberry and I hate my whole life!"

"Shut up!" Her stepfather yelled at her then tried to calm himself down. "I am really tempted to dump her at the side of the road!"

"Are we being chased by a white limo?" His driverin the dark blue baseball caplooked back to Boss Hogg and Sheriff Coltrane in the patrol car behind throughthe rear view mirror.

_Balladeer – "…Followed up by Rosco, the General Lee coming up along the outside and coming into the lead, and then Uncle Jesse in the pick-up, Cooter in the tow-truck and then Enos and Daisy at the end. You know, one of these days, they all ought to get a parade permit."_

"Pull over!" Bo smacked the Tempo with the General Lee.

"What kind of crazy town is this!" The other driver screamed back and saw a tree racing toward his grillwork. Turning the wrong way, he next saw air and then the car tilting toward open water below him. Gritting his teeth and closing his eyes, he heard screams and then felt a large crash as he hit hard earth under soft water rushing into the car. Up above him, the General Lee stopped quickly as Boss Hogg in his white limo passed him for a quick start near him only to be smashed into by Rosco in the patrol car. Reeling from the impact, Rosco looked round for his best friend.

"What a horrendous crash…" He saw Flash wrapped in the seat belt. "Aw, good girl…."

Racing down from the squealing of brake oil and brake pads, Bo and Luke opened up the flooded car in the two feet of water and pulled out the two kidnappers. From the back seat, a head of blonde hair from a shapely female body stretched across the back seat looked out gratefully and beamed her lucky-to-be-alive grin.

"You boys got a lot of explaining to do!" Bo pulled Daisy Mae's stepfather from the car out of the car ready to fight him, but the weary figure wasn't in a mood to fight. He just turned to the car.

"My car!" He wept for it. "My first car!"

"Lucky thing I'm here." Cooter grinned down into the water gully. "You boys need a tow truck?" He started laughing.

"You boys are in a lot of trouble!" Boss Hogg yelled at the strangers in the flooded car. "That young lady is under my custody. Rosco, arrest everyone! We'll clean up the mess later!"

"I ain't going back to Mayberry!" Daisy Mae screamed as Luke carried her to safety. "I hate it there. Uncle Jesse, I want to live with you at the farm. There's nothing to do back in Mayberry. My mom's gone and I don't…"

"Daisy," Her stepfather tried to be stern. "You've been skipping school since your mother died. I promised your mother I'd take care of you."

"Uncle Jesse…" Daisy Mae looked to the white-haired old man she had grown to love and respect.

"Now you listen here, young lady." Jesse looked at her. "I never been to this here Mayberry, but a town's a town, and I'm sure it's a very nice place if you'd just give it a chance. It seems to me that you're running away because you lost your mama, but you got to go home, so why don't you go home, only till you finish your schooling, and then, if you still want to, I'll be glad to have you come back."

"Well, this is all fine and good," Boss Hogg chewed on his cigar as he spoke. "But that young lady is under my custody until Sheriff Taylor comes to get her and give me my reward!"

"Mister…" The figure in the cap splashed and sloshed in the water up to his knees. "I don't recall my paw saying anything about no reward."

"And just who is your paw!" Hogg yelled back.

"Sheriff Taylor." The young man pulled off his cap to reveal a head full of red hair. "I'm his son, Opie Taylor."

Realizing he had been gypped out of an imaginary reward that had never existed, Boss Hogg pulled off his hat and began stomping it. Doing so caused him to sip into and land in the gully and splashed with mud. Even with Rosco coming to help him back up, he wasn't happy. He already had that fictional reward spent.

_Balladeer – "And that's the story of the Duke cousin from over the state line. Other-Daisy returned home as promised and went back to school and just to remind her of what she had to look forward to, the family even came to visit her once in a while. Strange thing is, Uncle Jesse kept reminding Sheriff Taylor of another mountain man from his part of the woods."_

"Mr. Duke…" Andy Taylor looked the white-haired patriarch over. "You look sort of familiar. You ever have been to Mayberry before."

"I ain't been this far north before in my life." Jesse answered solemnly. He heard the door to the courthouse opening and closing and looked over expecting to see Bo and Luke. Instead of his boys, he saw a skinny deputy sheriff drenched down to his uniform and wringing out his cap. Daisy looked away to conceal her smirking grin while younger Daisy tried to understand it.

"Barney, what happened to you!" Andy asked with loud concern.

"I caught this big orange car speeding down past Goober's gas station and I landed with the patrol car in Myers Lake!" He shuffled a bit defeated and embarrassingly waved his skinny arms. "All I saw was taillights and exhaust!"

Sheriff Taylor turned to Jesse Duke.

"Mister Duke," Andy looked up with a bit of small town wisdom. "You ought to tell those boys to slow down a might. They're going to get themselves hurt some day."

"From your lips to God's ears." Jesse answered back.

_Balladeer – "You all come back, you hear."_

END


End file.
